XVII.—On a Set of Table-knives in the British Museum made for John the Intrepid, Duke of Burgundy

Abstract

In the year 1855 the British Museum acquired a set of four knives with enamelled handles in a leather case decorated with incised designs. The handles are richly ornamented with shields of arms, mottoes, and floral motives in translucent enamel upon silver, the grip having in addition strips of the speckled maple-wood used in the manufacture of mazers. These knives deserve description and careful illustration both for their artistic merit and also for their historical interest, it being possible to identify the two different persons for whom the instruments and the sheath were severally made. These persons were John the Intrepid, Duke of Burgundy, father of Philip the Good, and his daughter Isabel, Countess of Penthièvre.